Great Service is a Choice

Great Service is a Choice

Excerpt from Harvey Mackay about a cab driver.

Harvey was waiting in line for a ride at the Airport. When a cab pulled up, the first thing he noticed was that the taxi was polished to a bright shine. Smartly dressed in a white shirt, black tie, and freshly pressed black slacks, the cab driver jumped out and rounded the car to open the back passenger door for Harvey. He handed him a laminated card and said:

“I’m Wally, your driver. While I’m loading your bags in the trunk, I’d like you to read my mission statement.”

Wally’s Mission Statement:

“To get my customers to their destination in the quickest, safest and cheapest way possible, in a friendly environment”.

This blew Harvey away. Especially when he noticed that the inside of the cab matched the outside. Spotlessly clean! As he slid behind the wheel, Wally said, “Would you like a cup of coffee? I have a thermos of regular and one of decaf.”

Harvey said jokingly, “No, I’d prefer a soft drink.”

Wally smiled and said, “No problem. I have a cooler up front with regular and Diet Coke, water and orange juice.”

Almost stuttering, Harvey said, “I’ll take a Diet Coke.”

Handing him his drink, Wally said, “If you’d like something to read, I have The Wall Street Journal, Time, Sports Illustrated and USA Today.”

As if that weren’t enough, Wally told Harvey that he had the air conditioning on and asked if the temperature was comfortable for him. Then he advised Harvey of the best route to his destination for that time of day.

“Tell me, Wally,” Harvey asked the driver, “have you always served customers like this?”

Wally smiled into the rear-view mirror. “No, not always. In fact, it’s only been in the last two years. My first five years of driving, I spent most of my time complaining like all the rest of the cabbies do. Then I heard the personal growth guru, Wayne Dyer, on the radio one day. He said, ‘Stop complaining! Differentiate yourself from your competitors. “Don’t be a duck; Ducks quack and complain. Be an Eagle; Eagles soar above the crowd.”

“That hit me right between the eyes,” said Wally. “Dyer was really talking about me. I was always quacking and complaining, so I decided to change my attitude and become an Eagle. The other cabs were dirty, the drivers were unfriendly, and the customers were unhappy. So I decided to make some changes. I put in a few at a time. When my customers responded well, I did more.”

I take it that has paid off for you,” Harvey said.

“It sure has,” Wally replied. “My first year as an Eagle, I doubled my income from the previous year. This year I’ll probably quadruple it. You were lucky to get me today. I don’t sit at cabstands anymore. My customers call me for appointments on my cell phone or leave a message on my answering machine. If I can’t pick them up myself, I get a reliable cabbie friend to do it and I take a piece of the action.”

Wally was phenomenal. He was running a limo service out of a Yellow Cab.

Wally the Cab Driver made a different choice. He decided to stop quacking like ducks and start soaring like Eagles.

No one ever attains very eminent success by simply doing what is required of him; it is the amount and excellence of what is over and above the required that determines the greatness of ultimate distinction.

Think about this: “The man who does more than he is paid for will soon be paid for more than he does”.

Meditation: But by the grace of God I am what I am, and His grace toward me was not in vain; but I labored more abundantly than they all, yet not I, but the grace of God which was with me. – 1 Corinthians 15:10

You will succeed in Jesus Name!

Our Duty in the World

 

Our duty in this world is to help others by showing them their roses and not their thorns. Only then can we achieve the love we should feel for each other; only then can we bloom in our own garden.

- Daily Dew

Roses & Thorns

 

One of the greatest gifts a person can possess is to be able to reach past the thorns and find the rose within others. This is the characteristic of love, to look at a person, and knowing his faults, recognize the nobility in his soul, and help him realize that he can overcome his faults. If we show him the rose, he will conquer the thorns.

- Daily Dew

Choices

Jerry is the kind of guy you love to hate. He is always in a good mood and always has something positive to say. When someone would ask him how he was doing, he would reply, ‘If I were any better, I would be twins!’

He was a unique manager because he had several waiters who had followed him around from restaurant to restaurant. The reason the waiters followed Jerry was because of his attitude. He was a natural motivator. If an employee was having a bad day, Jerry was there telling the employee how to look on the positive.

Seeing this style really made me curious, so one day I went up to Jerry and asked him, ‘I don’t get it! You can’t be a positive person all of the time. How do you do it?’

Jerry replied, ‘Each morning I wake up and say to myself, Jerry, you have two choices today. You can choose to be in a good mood or you can choose to be in a bad mood.’ I choose to be in a good mood.

Each time something bad happens, I can choose to be a victim or I can choose to learn from it. I choose to learn from it. Every time someone comes to me complaining, I can choose to accept their complaining or I can point out the positive side of life. I choose the positive side of life.’

‘Yeah, right, it’s not that easy,’ I protested. ‘Yes, it is,’ Jerry said. ‘Life is all about choices. When you cut away all the junk, every situation is a choice. You choose how you react to situations. You choose how people will affect your mood. You choose to be in a good mood or a bad mood.

I reflected on what Jerry said. Soon thereafter, I left the restaurant industry to start my own business. We lost touch, but I often thought about him when I made a choice about life instead of reacting to it.

Several years later, I heard that Jerry did something you are never supposed to do in a restaurant business: he left the back door open one morning and was held up at gunpoint by three armed robbers. While trying to open the safe, his hand, shaking from nervousness, slipped off the combination. The robbers shot him. Luckily, Jerry was found relatively quickly and rushed to the local trauma center. After 18 hours of surgery and weeks of intensive care, Jerry was released from the hospital with fragments of the bullets still in his body.

I saw Jerry about six months after the accident. When I asked him how he was, he replied, ‘If I were any better, I’d be twins. Wanna see my scars?’ I declined to see his wounds but did ask him what had gone through his mind as the robbery took place.

‘The first thing that went through my mind was that I should have locked the back door,’ Jerry replied. ‘Then, as I lay on the floor, I remembered that I had two choices: I could choose to live or I could choose to die. I chose to live.’

‘Weren’t you scared? Did you lose consciousness?’ I asked.

Jerry continued, ‘….the paramedics were great. They kept telling me I was going to be fine. But when they wheeled me into the ER and I saw the expressions on the faces of the doctors and nurses, I got really scared. In their eyes, I read ‘he’s a dead man.’ I knew I needed to take action.’’

What did you do?’ I asked. ‘Well, there was a big burly nurse shouting questions at me,’ said Jerry. She asked if I was allergic to anything.

‘Yes,’ I replied. The doctors and nurses stopped working as they waited for my reply. I took a deep breath and yelled, ‘Bullets!’

Over their laughter, I told them, ‘I am choosing to live. Operate on me as if I am alive, not dead.’

Jerry lived thanks to the skill of his doctors, but also because of his amazing attitude. I learned from him that every day we have the choice to live fully. Attitude, after all, is everything.

Meditation: But by the grace of God I am what I am, and His grace toward me was not in vain; but I labored more abundantly than they all, yet not I, but the grace of God which was with me. – 1 Corinthians 15:10

You will succeed in Jesus Name!

Booster of Potential

Booster of potential…

Saul called David’s attention to the natural things. David called Saul’s attention to the supernatural things [paraphrased].
– 1 Samuel 17:33-37 

What we do not see are naturally bigger and more powerful than what we see. An oceanographer would tell you that the most populated part of the earth is the ocean. We don’t see this fact until we dive into the bottom of the sea. Do you know the buried part of an iceberg on the water is usually a hundred times bigger than the head we see above water?

Ask a structural engineer and he would tell you that the foundation of a building is stronger than the whole bricks piled on it. We do not see the foundation while we usually admire the obvious building. We are often attracted by the unimportant.

You cannot afford to be too conscious of your physical development at the expense of inner growth. How much of the money you spend goes into investing in your inner person? Those things you do not see about you are what defines you. In other words, they are what determine your realities. Those people who succeed paid greater attention to what is going on inside them than what is happening around them.

Inner growth is a choice. John C. Maxwell says, “Growth is optional. You can choose to grow or fight it. But know this: people unwilling to grow will never reach their potential.” Investing attention in inner growth is a decision that can really make a difference in a person’s life. Taking a step towards inner growth would include consistently doing the following:

• Commit to healthy thinking for at least 30 minutes daily
• Daily study of the Bible and meditation on its insights
• Regular reading of useful magazines, dailies, books, and literature in your career field.
• Improve the quality of your inner circle.
• Invest and attend meetings or conferences that focus on the kind of development you seek.
• Participate in social responsibility efforts (this helps you to contribute positively and it is a very vital nutrient to growing on the inside).
• Pray for divine help in your inner growth ambition.

This list may not be exhaustive, but they adequately represent a good starting point. They would not matter if you are not craving for quality inner life. No man ever feels successful by amassing only external successes. His fulfilment is in maturity, strength, and the wealth of his inner man.

You will succeed in Jesus Name!

Choose the Problem You Solve

 

None of us is meant to solve every problem. Learning to choose the problem to solve is the beginning of personal liberty.

- Babatunde Oladele

The Quality and Quantity of Punctuality

 

Inasmuch as I discourage and sanction late coming, I also do not pay bonus for punctuality. You can come early and achieve nothing. What I reward is the quality and quantity of your output in an 8-hour workday - Babatunde Oladele